Will Kenny Pickett be the Steelers QB 1… 2… or 3?
Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin has been mum about who the team’s starting quarterback will be heading into their Week 1 game on the road against their AFC North division foe the Cincinnati Bengals.
This has led many people to speculate as to whether the Steelers first round draft pick, and top quarterback taken overall in this year’s NFL Draft, Kenny Pickett, could be named as Ben Roethlisberger’s heir to start the season.
However, there are also cases to be made for Pickett to be the backup – or even sit and learn holding a clipboard on game days.
Here are the three scenarios the rookie could be facing and why each is a plausible one.
Starting Quarterback
There’s no doubt that when the Steelers selected their next-door neighbor from the University of Pittsburgh, Kenny Pickett, with the 20th overall pick, that they are planning on him being the future face of the franchise.
The question is whether the organization is prepared to make that a reality sooner rather than later.
The Steelers signed free agent QB Mitchell Trubisky, likely the best available in this year’s crop, as a potential Week 1 starter. While Trubisky hasn’t done anything to lose the job, he also hasn’t gone out and seized it by any large margin, leaving doubt as to whether the former second-overall pick of the 2017 NFL Draft won the starting job outright.
That may be enough for the decision makers to jump straight to Pickett as their guy to lead the Steelers offense in 2022.
Backup Quarterback
Some are of the opinion that Pickett should wait and learn, much like Patrick Mahomes did for a full season behind Alex Smith in Kansas City. In that situation, Andy Reid didn’t have to rush his young passer onto the field – unlike some other coaches who have hotter seats and could lose their jobs, Tomlin faces a similar situation as Reid where job security also means the head coach doesn’t need force Pickett into the starring role.
Yet, Pickett showed he was the most “pro ready” of this year’s quarterback draft class by posting impressive numbers in the preseason while showing the poise of a much more seasoned veteran.
This has started a verbal petition to advance to the future now, rather than wait several weeks or even a full year before Pickett inevitably becomes the starter anyway.
Still others feel that a porous offensive line, that may have many of the same woes as last season, could ruin the younger quarterback before he even gets going. While a valid point, the o-line didn’t seem to phase Kenny’s game through three exhibition games, posting a 124.7 quarterback rating while completing 80.6% of his passes.
If Mitch Trubisky wins the starting job, he may not have it for long. Pickett’s arrival alone suggests that the veteran Trubisky will be looking over his shoulder each week as a placeholder keeping the seat warm until the rookie is ready to take over.
The Steelers could opt to keep Pickett in that primary spot behind Trubisky, and pull the trigger at any moment – or even in games where the team is so far ahead or behind there’s no harm in giving the Pitt product some real reps. Most suggest that it would be easier to go to Pickett after starting Trubisky, instead of the other way around.
While this seems the most likely of the three scenarios, there’s still one more idea that isn’t being floated around in the mainstream sports media…
QB3
After the wonderful preseason that Kenny Pickett had, and considering him as a potential Week 1 starter, it almost seems like blasphemy that anyone would suggest he’s not at least the starter or the backup – but instead, the third quarterback on the depth chart.
While I think this could be the biggest stretch of the three landing spots for Pickett, it’s plausible if the team goes the Mahomes route and doesn’t plan to play him at all in 2022.
Mason Rudolph, who was drafted in 2018 and developed as a potential heir behind Roethlisberger, also had a good training camp and preseason. So good, he was the subject of possible trade rumors right up to the team reducing their roster to 53 players.
Part of those rumors, which apparently had some merit, was a misunderstanding by most of the national sports media, where they failed to recognize that the Steelers always keep three quarterbacks on their main roster. (This goes all the way back to Bill Cowher’s days, where the team even had four passers on the depth chart when Kordell Stewart was drafted.)
Several Steelers beat writers reported that the front office wasn’t keen on the offers they entertained for Rudolph and preferred to keep him as an “insurance policy”. This could indicate a lesson learned from the recent 2019 season, where Rudolph was rushed onto the field as a backup in place of Big Ben, then gave way to undrafted FCS product Devlin Hodges.
Pittsburgh probably does not want to follow that same path again anytime soon.
Similarly, Roethlisberger found his way into playing time as a rookie after being third on the team’s depth chart behind Tommy Maddox and Charlie Batch, both of whom got hurt early through 2004 season. He would never cede the starting job, winning the NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year award that season, then leading the Steelers to the Super Bowl in the next.
If some of the development or even offensive line concerns are legitimate, then the current Steelers staff could make the same decision to keep Pickett stashed further down the bench. Rather than be an injury away from starting a rookie with no regular season experience, they could opt to keep Rudolph in the same role he’s had for the last three seasons as the team’s primary backup quarterback.
While the thought may appear to be sensational, it might be what the team is considering by keeping Rudolph on the roster – and also why they haven’t named a starter to date, playing a little bit of gamesmanship with their upcoming opponent, so Cincinnati can’t key in on any single quarterback while preparing for their Week 1 clash.
